The Barbie Movie

Filmfarsi

July 2019 •English

A found-footage essay, Filmfarsi salvages low budget thrillers and melodramas suppressed following the 1979 Islamic revolution.

The March on Rome

October 2022 •Italian

The fascinating story of the rise to power of dictator Benito Mussolini (1883-1945) in Italy in 1922 and how fascism marked the fate of the entire world in the dark years to come.

Long Live Hunting!

November 2014 •Czech

This documentary essay introduces a peculiar trio of men united by their passion for hunting. Each of them conceives of hunting in his own way, luring the viewer to an exotic safari, to an antlered trophy collection or to a sitting in the woods.

The Green Fog

January 2018 •English

A tribute to a fascinating film shot by Alfred Hitchcock in 1958, starring James Stewart and Kim Novak, and to the city of San Francisco, California, where the magic was created; but also a challenge: how to pay homage to a masterpiece without using its footage; how to do it simply by gathering images from various sources, all of them haunted by the curse of a mysterious green fog that seems to cause irrepressible vertigo…

In the Intense Now

November 2017 •Portuguese

A personal essay which analyses and compares images of the political upheavals of the 1960s. From the military coup in Brazil to China's Cultural Revolution, from the student uprisings in Paris to the end of the Prague Spring.

Everyday Maneuver

June 2018 •

Everyday Maneuver is a video that presents the viewer with an unrealistic scenery. Shot from a drone, it shows a city at daytime, but there isn't a single human being in it. What seems disconnected from everyday life, and as artificial as a landscape created with computer graphics, is in fact a recording that was made during one of the annual "Wanan Air Raid Drills" that have been implemented in Taiwan since 1978.

Cinema Now

April 2022 •English

A fragmented collection of independent closed cinemas, in London during lockdown, captured on Super 8mm film.

Terra incognita

November 2024 •Italian

Sarasota Half in Dream

April 2017 •English

An experimental documentary about dead turtles, crab swarms, decaying tennis courts, and microscopic histories. The filmmakers shot their explorations into the abandoned golf courses, factories, and resorts of Sarasota, Florida and spoke to local youths who are using them for new and strange purposes. What would the Surrealists and Situationists think of a suburban, subtropical tourist town? What goes on in a storage unit in the dead of night? What is the afterlife of a decommissioned train car? What ghosts haunt a ruined hotel? What is the life cycle of a city? When will waters wash it all away?

F for Fake

September 1973 •French

Documents the lives of infamous fakers Elmyr de Hory and Clifford Irving. De Hory, who later committed suicide to avoid more prison time, made his name by selling forged works of art by painters like Picasso and Matisse. Irving was infamous for writing a fake autobiography of Howard Hughes. Welles moves between documentary and fiction as he examines the fundamental elements of fraud and the people who commit fraud at the expense of others.

The Water Map

November 2024 •Spanish

The Water Map is an essayistic journey through the ethnography and landscapes of the Region of Murcia. These places are in the process of disappearing due to the increasing and abundant agricultural exploitation. Water has marked the territory and the culture of the area, and with its disappearance, the memories of four characters fade away.

The Fall of Communism as Seen in Gay Pornography

January 1998 •English

Every image in The Fall of Communism as Seen in Gay Pornography comes from gay erotic videos produced in Eastern Europe since the introduction of capitalism. The video provides a glimpse of young men responding to the pressures of an unfamiliar world, one in which money, power and sex are now connected.

Oblivion

October 2024 •Russian

A lone passenger is reflected in the windows of a train crawling through layers of textures towards Minsk. During his absence, the city has not changed: all the streets are frozen, long-gone voices can be heard in the empty rooms and around the corner you can find yourself in a video game from your childhood.

Locations: Looking for Rusty James

August 2013 •Spanish

A personal meditation on Rumble Fish, the legendary film directed by Francis Ford Coppola in 1983; the city of Tulsa, Oklahoma, USA, where it was shot; and its impact on the life of several people from Chile, Argentina and Uruguay related to film industry.

Visions of Europe

May 2004 •English

Twenty-five films from twenty-five European countries by twenty-five European directors.

The Cooking Show

February 2021 •English

The cooking show is as old as television itself. But why do we like watching the making of a meal that most of us will never cook, let alone eat? Dirty Furniture’s jam-packed video essay is a rollercoaster ride through the history of the genre, at once a staple of television viewing and a hotpot of shifting perspectives and sociocultural values.

Visit, or Memories and Confessions

October 1993 •Portuguese

A long-hidden, personal doc about leaving a beloved house by the late, revered Portuguese director Manoel de Oliveira.

KWAIDAN

December 2022 •Portuguese

Out of the Mist: An Alternate History of New Zealand Cinema

July 2015 •English

Two decades on from Cinema of Unease, Tim Wong’s essay film contemplates the prevailing image of a national cinema while privileging some of the images and image-makers displaced by the popular view of filmmaking in Aotearoa. Now streaming for free at: films.lumiere.net.nz

Histoire(s) du Cinéma 1b: A Single (Hi)story

November 1989 •French

A very personal look at the history of cinema directed, written and edited by Jean-Luc Godard in his Swiss residence in Rolle for ten years (1988-98); a monumental collage, constructed from film fragments, texts and quotations, photos and paintings, music and sound, and diverse readings; a critical, beautiful and melancholic vision of cinematographic art.